An Electric Car Update – Denmark’s Subsidy Is £18,000
Sunday, 16. October 2011
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We seem to know precious little about electric vehicles which may well be the reason why so few are being sold. It can’t be so much about cost as they are subsidised by the government in order to encourage ownership, or is price the reason? The price of an electric vehicle compared to its equivalent petrol or diesel version is spectacularly high. The sales in the UK are abysmal but they’re still higher than say Denmark who sold 283 in the first half of 2011 even after giving subsidies of 20,588 Euros or £17,924 compared to the UK’s £5,000.
In Norway 850 cars were bought but they had subsidies of 17,524 Euros or £15,256. In Belgium a mere 85 were bought even with subsidies of 10,907 Euros or £9,496.
The debate will no doubt continue but I would suggest that pricing is a major issue. The other is charging the batteries.
An ideal way to charge your car if you were about to go on holiday would of course be to plug it in whilst away at the airport but at Heathrow you can only charge your car in the short stay car park which costs £50 per day or £350 per week. Not so cheap then. At Gatwick you can charge your car for free in the short term car parks of north and south terminals. The good news is that you also get 4 hours free parking whilst the car is being charged. Neither Luton or Stanstead offer any charging facilities. Little Chef has announced that they will have a charging point at every one of their restaurants by the end of 2012. The charge points will provide 7kw of power compared to a domestic 3kw, thereby halving the charge time. This means that the average car can be fully recharged in 4 hours. Cars overstaying whilst recharging will not be subject to fines. The aim of Little Chef is to make sure that 90% of the population will be within 30 miles of a charging point.
Little Chef have also said that you don’t even have to eat in their restaurant to charge your car but this will only apply to the first year of installation. Watch this space, maybe the slow take up is down to uncertainty! By Graham Hill
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